LaVonne Neff
The United States of intoxication
18th-century colonists drank beer with breakfast and continued throughout the day, with average consumption twice as high as today’s.
Picturing dementia
Dementia is graphic. These illustrated narratives draw out insights to provide empathy and healing for caregivers.
Room to grow up
Are today's young adults more immature than their age mates in previous generations? Yes, says Julie Lythcott-Haims, but it's not their fault.
A room to herself
The setup sounds like a medieval soap opera. But Robyn Cadwallader knows far too much about the 13th century to write an anachronistic romance.
A Spool of Blue Thread, by Anne Tyler
Anne Tyler's 20th novel is, like her previous 19, about a mildly dysfunctional Baltimore family of loyal yet infuriating people who love one another, but not always helpfully.
Incurable condition
Not every ailment can be fixed—or should be. Atul Gawande thinks we need to talk about this.
Pope on the bus?
Pope Francis and Simone Campbell's recent books have much in common. Yet the standoff between U.S. sisters and the Vatican continues.
Holding on and letting go
The aging-parent memoir is a crowded genre. Still, I was eager to read Jeanne Murray Walker’s account of her mother’s last years. I wasn’t disappointed.
The American Health Care Paradox, by Elizabeth H. Bradley and Lauren A. Taylor
Elizabeth Bradley and Lauren Taylor may have written one of the three most important books your member of Congress will never read.
A Dog Walks into a Nursing Home, by Sue Halpern
Pransky, a middle-aged Labradoodle, was bored. So was Sue Halpern, Pransky's owner. Then Halpern learned about Therapy Dogs International.
Cross-shaped story
On April 13, 2005, Richard Lischer's 33-year-old son, Adam, phoned his dad. The cancer had spread throughout Adam's body.
From Willow Creek to Sacred Heart, by Chris Haw
My first thought upon learning that Chris Haw had written a memoir about his journey to Catholicism was, Oh no—not another one.
Mad farmer?
Joel Salatin's new book offers a full banquet of opinions, prescriptions and rants. How does the man find time to farm?
Devil's Ink, by Jeffrey C. Pugh, and The Devil Wears Nada, by Tripp York
Jeffrey C. Pugh and Tripp York are Facebook friends. Both teach religion at southern institutions of higher learning. Last year, each wrote a good-natured book about Satan.
The Forgotten Affairs of Youth, by Alexander McCall Smith
Isabel Dalhousie, the Edinburgh-based philosopher who edits the Journal of Applied Ethics, is not everyone's cup of tea. Her niece, Cat, is usually irritated with her....
Rescuing Regina, by Josephe Marie Flynn
This book should be made into a movie. As a book, the story has several strikes against it. The central character is not well known outside Milwaukee....
Virtually You, by Elias Aboujaoude
Enough already. Do I need yet another book to tell me that the latest
technology is messing with my head? Late medieval church leaders, after
all, didn't care for Gutenberg's invention, without which the
Reformation would have remained a purely local aberration.
On the move
When I hear the word immigration, I immediately think of friends, refugees from a war-torn country, who have spent more than 20 years and $30,000 trying to become legal U.S....
How our minds have changed
Computers are changing the way we think. "Calm, focused,
undistracted, the linear mind is being pushed aside by a new kind of
mind that wants and needs to take in and dole out information in short,
disjointed, often overlapping bursts—the faster, the better." This is
probably not a good thing, says Nicholas Carr.